The Cloud Of Unknowing

EDITED, WITH AN INTRODUCTION

BY

JAMES WALSH, S.J.

PREFACE

BY

SIMON TUGWELL, O.P.

PAULIST PRESS

Cover art:

The artist, ANN DALTON, was born in Ossining, New York and now resides in New York City. A graduate of Pratt Institute in Brooklyn and Columbia University, she has done illustrations for the New York Times, New York Magazine, and several books. Her cover reflects her appreciation of the image of the inscrutable God presented in The Cloud.

Design: Barbini, Pesce & Noble, Inc.

Copyright © 1981 by Paulist Press, Inc.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system without permission in writing from the publisher.

Library of Congress

Catalog Card Number: 81-82201

ISBN: 0-8091-2332-0

Published by Paulist Press

997 Macarthur Boulevard

Mahwah, New Jersey 07430

THE CLASSICS OF WESTERN SPIRITUALITY

A Library of the Great Spiritual Masters

President and Publisher

Kevin A. Lynch, C.S.P.

EDITORIAL BOARD

Editor-in-Chief

Richard J. Payne

Associate Editor

John Farina

Editorial Consultant

Ewert H. Cousins—Professor and Director of Spirituality Graduate Program, Fordham University, Bronx, N.Y.

John E. Booty—Professor of Church History, Episcopal Divinity School, Cambridge, Mass.

Joseph Dan—Professor of Kaballah in the Department of Jewish Thought, Hebrew University, Jerusalem, Israel.

Albert Deblaere—Professor of the History of Spirituality, Gregorian University, Rome, Italy.

Louis Dupré—T.L. Riggs Professor in Philosophy of Religion, Yale University, New Haven, Conn.

Rozanne Elder—Executive Vice President, Cistercian Publications, Kalamazoo, Mich.

Mircea Eliade—Professor in the Department of the History of Religions, University of Chicago, Chicago, Ill.

Anne Fremantle—Teacher, Editor and Writer, New York, N.Y.

Karlfried Froelich—Professor of the History of the Early and Medieval Church, Princeton Theological Seminary, Princeton, N.J.

Arthur Green—Assistant Professor in the Department of Religious Thought, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, Pa.

Stanley S. Harakas—Dean of Holy Cross Greek Orthodox Seminary, Brookline, Mass.

Jean Leclercq—Professor, Institute of Spirituality and Institute of Religious Psychology, Gregorian University, Rome, Italy.

Miguel León-Portilla-Professor Mesoamerican Cultures and Languages, National University of Mexico, University City, Mexico.

George A. Maloney, S.J.—Director, John XXIII Ecumenical Center, Fordham University, Bronx, N.Y.

Bernard McGinn—Associate Professor of Historical Theology and History of Christianity, University of Chicago Divinity School, Chicago, Ill.

John Meyendorff—Professor of Church History, Fordham University, Bronx, N.Y., and Professor of Patristics and Church History, St. Vladimir’s Seminary, Tuckahoe, N.Y.

Seyyed Hossein Nasr—Professor of Islamics, Department of Religion, Temple University, Philadelphia, Pa., ...